Hearthstone bot maker closes down following Blizzard botting bans

The maker of the Hearthcrawler and Warcrawler bot software has shut down its operations after Blizzard banned "several thousand" bot accounts last week. In a statement posted on its website, the developers said they're sad about pulling the plug, but knew that this day would come.

"This is our last official announcement. The recent ban wave in Hearthstone hit a lot of users," the statement posted at Warcrawler.com says. "After discussing this with Blizzard, it’s clear we have to take off our services/products now. Please note that we’re not going to be commenting further on this."

"Thank you all for being part of our community. We are very sad about this but you also know botting is against the rules and we all knew that the day when our products doesn't work anymore would come."

Blizzard dropped the banhammer on "several thousand" Hearthstone bot accounts last week, saying, "Fair play is at the core of the Hearthstone experience, and cheating and botting will not be tolerated," but those bans will expire in 2015. Blizzard also recently implemented permanent bans against "win traders," and said that future botting bans will be permanent as well.